Behind the Explosion in Socialism Among American Teens

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“There are a lot of myths about what socialism is,” says Ginty. “High school is the perfect time to start educating ourselves. We are the next generation of voters. We can’t keep depending on older adults to lead the way.”

TAMPA, FLA.—In a fluorescent lit classroom with handmade posters covering one wall, approximately 15 high school students are chanting the words of black revolutionary Assata Shakur: “It is our duty to fight for our freedom. It is our duty to win. We must love each other and we must support each other. We have nothing to lose but our chains.” With some embarrassed giggling, they recite it once, twice, three times, led by their visiting speaker, Pamela Gomez of the Hillsborough Community Protection Coalition, an alliance of local progressive groups.

These students are some of the 40-odd members of the Blake High School chapter of the Young Democratic Socialists of America (YDSA). The Tampa high school has 1,697 students, a majority of them black or Latino, and the YDSA chapter reflects that. The chapter also has a high concentration of LGBTQ students, the club’s biggest demographic bloc.

The chapter is the brainchild of Graham Shelor, 17. Slim and sandy-haired, a contemporary dancer as well as an organizer, Shelor grew up in a “fairly liberal” household but became disillusioned with the Democratic Party during the 2016 elections. “They lied to me and the people of America that they were going to make it work,” he says. “It led to a domino effect of me seeing the flaws in the current American system.”

Blake’s chapter is part of the youthful explosion of interest in socialism that has led to YDSA’s impressive recent growth, with 130 chapters and organizing committees, a five-fold increase in two years. Since 2015, the average age of a DSA member has dropped from 64 to 30.

YDSA’s members must be under 31 and are usually affiliated with a university or high school chapter. University chapters outnumber high school chapters by about 10 to 1. Like its parent organization, YDSA is multi-issue and “big tent.” It doesn’t require members to subscribe to any particular ideology beyond a commitment to feminism and an opposition to racism, imperialism, homophobia, transphobia and, of course, capitalism.

Chapters are largely autonomous: Though many work with their local DSA chapter, they’re not required to. Often, they focus on youth and campus-specific labor issues, like graduate student organizing or fighting the privatization of facilities staff at state universities. Blake’s YDSA has rallied in support of a long-promised wage hike for their teachers.

The meeting begins with announcements about upcoming actions, like canvassing for Medicare for All with the Tampa DSA. Then an invitation is issued to join Hillsborough Community Protection Coalition in campaigning for Black Lives Matter, immigrant rights and environmental justice.

For co-chair Kayla Ginty, 16, YDSA is more than a conduit to political action: It’s led her to question inherited political beliefs and define her adult political identity.

“There are a lot of myths about what socialism is,” says Ginty. “High school is the perfect time to start educating ourselves. We are the next generation of voters. We can’t keep depending on older adults to lead the way.”

“When the [2008 financial] crisis hit, I think a lot of [young] people experienced the impact of that on their home lives,” says YDSA National Coordinating Committee co-chair Michelle Fisher, 20. “Their parents got laid off, they got evicted from their homes, and they needed to be able to do something about it.”

In the 2016 primaries, 2 million people under 30—YDSA age—voted for Bernie Sanders, far more than voted for Clinton (770,000) and Trump (830,000) combined. A survey conducted by Harvard University’s Institute of Politics found only a minority—42 percent—of millennials support capitalism.

There’s a popular belief that youthful radicals turn into middle-aged conservatives. A 2014 study by Columbia University political scientists, however, found that “the political events of a voter’s teenage and early adult years, centered around the age of 18, are enormously important in the formation of these long-term partisan preferences.”

For the students in Blake High School YDSA, the “enormously important” political events of their formative years will include the surprisingly successful campaign of Bernie Sanders, the election-year failures of the Democratic Party and the rise of Trump. These events took place against a backdrop of skyrocketing student debt, a dismal job market, a significant decline in upward mobility, and the first shocks of capitalism driven climate change.

“Our generation is really political because we have to be,” says Fisher.

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I'm glad to see DSA and YDSA growing exponentially and moving to the left of the old "social democratic" DSA. But the "big tent" now seems to include people who are Stalinoids if not flat-out Stalinists. I don't know how many there are, but they gotta go. The "democratic" in "democratic socialist" is there for a reason. And opposing "Western" imperialism doesn't mean one shouldn't oppose Russian imperialism in Syria (to use the most obvious example) too. The left has really fucked up on this since at least 2013.

Posted by Bipolar Blabbermouth on 2018-03-23 16:30:45

Re Marx: There are two factors; one of which has been commented upon. Here are these two points: First the corporate right can dangle Marx out to young people who are looking for a better way of managing our world. (The right-wing owns the big media.) Marx was brilliant, and a good foundation for progressive thought; but he's dead, and not really tied to our current bad situation. So young people get caught up in theory, which is spun by conflicting thoughts, swirling; and so very often they do not get into the "on-the-ground" details of the nasty control that the crooked gangsters have. I believe that many of the people promoting Marx, in left groups today, are being paid by the right (see the Koch Bros). Second, the sincere Marxist people on the left, now, are generally caught up in various Marxist theories, which are usually too tied to old Capitalism, and too tied to top-down authoritarian control. But our modern-world problems need modern-world solutions. Community ownership of the common elements of our modern world is a major concept of socialism; and good. So is having a real concern for welfare of all of our citizens (Too often the sincere Marxists only talk about helping a fairly small group of people in our country. People that they want to teach and lead, much like some religion.) We can jettison authoritarian thinking; we don't need new "religions". Big-religion is enough of a problem right now, to be sure.

Posted by Steve in DC on 2018-02-19 03:48:34

Conservatives and Republicans are also using the failure of North Korea and Venezuela as well. In addition, they still keep attacking socialism in Western and Northern Europe.

Posted by disqus_ZBXJDbYJHe on 2018-02-18 22:45:50

None of this would be happening if the older adults starting with Reagan had not deregulated the economy.

Posted by disqus_ZBXJDbYJHe on 2018-02-18 22:44:34

Glad the kids are getting involved considering the fact that the Greatest Generation and part of the baby boomer generation, and wealthy people are destroying America and the world. The kids should get a chance to go to Europe and see how socialism works on that continent.

Posted by disqus_ZBXJDbYJHe on 2018-02-18 22:43:28

This is the greatest news I've read since the 1980's when the Republican conservatives actually first launched their Fascist objectives of gaining and maintaining control of "EVERYTHING". Every time I would read about another "Republican Think Tank" ( oxymoron) I cringed to see what that cabal would produce. My concern is how are you going to convince the elderly and the single issue voters that the Republicans are hell-bent on destroying and removing every safety net that has protected them since President Franklin D. Roosevelt created them after the "Great Republican Depression". Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid as well as all social programs that benefit the less fortunate have been thorns in the Republican psyche since these programs were created by "DEMOCRATS". Every CIVILIZED western nation and many of the "s--thole nations have some form of Universal Health Care for their citizens EXCEPT the United States! I hope the YDSA grows very quickly to defeat every Republican running for public office so that this country can once again concentrate it's greatness on lifting all souls and not just those who are wealthy enough to afford it.

Posted by XtremLiberl on 2018-02-17 12:18:35

I think he meant the right accuses anyone promoting more social programs as being a Marxist or uses the example of failure of the USSR as a reason why more social programs will never work......not that the right is advocating the ideas of Marxism.

Posted by martman1 on 2018-02-17 11:15:42

Fantastic! Capitalism depends on growth. Our Earth is finite, and we have grown to a point where we can see the limits. To continue as a species, we must figure out how to work together with one another (socialism), instead of trying to outdo each other (capitalism). Let's hope this young generation is more successful than we were in the 60s/70s.

Posted by rplantz on 2018-02-17 10:39:25

Example of this please?

Posted by Nylene13 on 2018-02-17 10:35:29

It's important that we tie the humane and progressive ideas, and plans, of socialism to the problems of today. And to work at effectively dealing with the current world, which, sadly, has been hijacked by the wealthy right-wing gangsters. Many on the right are using some of the regressive ideas of Marxism to confuse and sidetrack the young. We must not let this happen.

Posted by Steve in DC on 2018-02-17 08:38:48

We can surely all work together. I feel that they ( the young people) are the ones they have been waiting for. They can teach us that our ways are not necessarily their ways, and they will be right in trying to find there own ways out of this mess that got all of us in it's grip. It is their future.

Posted by ideruyter on 2018-02-15 23:48:09

Great news! Us older folks need to help them study and learn. Remember it's an international movement, with no barriers of race, nationality, etc.